Before he became famous as Mr. Limbaughs bête noire, Dr. Nash widely recognized as a leading figure in so-called New Left History who rejected the discipline’s traditional focus on elites as movers of history in favor of everyday life.
His book “Red, White and Black: The Peoples of Early America” (1974), for example, looked at the colonial era through the eyes of Indians, working class whites, and free and enslaved blacks.
Although he spent the rest of his life in Los Angeles, Dr. Nash was fond of Philadelphia and often used his hometown to illustrate his man-on-the-street approach. In “The Urban Crucible: The Northern Seaports and the Origins of the American Revolution” (1979), a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, he examined how political ideas among sailors, dockworkers and other workers in Philadelphia – including Boston and New York – played a crucial role in the independence movement.
“It changed the focus of what people were doing from the standard study of ideology and ideas to the actions of ordinary people on the ground,” said Mary Beth Norton, a historian at Cornell University, in an interview.
Dr. Nash saw a continuation between his approach to history and his commitment to contemporary education and grassroots politics. After the Watts Riots in 1965, he joined an organization that supported black entrepreneurs. He was working to liquidate Pacific Palisades, the affluent area of Los Angeles where he lived. And after the university’s Board of Regents fired black activist Angela Davis from her post as professor of sociology, Dr. Nash set up a faculty committee to reinstate her.
Although his critics often labeled him anti-American – or worse – Dr. Nash insisted he was optimistic about the country.
“If you were a radical left historian in the United States, you would not have written what he did. He’s always been optimistic about the United States, ”said Carla Pestana, a PhD student with Dr. Nash studied and is now the chairman of UCLA’s history department. “He thought the real story was about common people trying to make the country better.”
